A month and a half of progress in the kitchen

    I can't believe a month and a half of work has already gone by! We moved our first-floor furniture to the basement and upstairs in early June and then demo began. Not wild and crazy demo with a pack of contractors in matching shirts and crow bars like they do on HGTV, but really just removing parts bit by bit as the old was in the way and needed to make room for the new. The carpet with gross stains in the dining room is STILL in place, with about a dozen new stains, but it won't come out until the popcorn ceiling above is ground down and smoothed over. 

   We've gone through two major renovations before, so we know there are work weeks with behind-the-scene things that go slowly and weeks with really visible stuff that makes the transformation feel like it's flying by. We've had a little bit of both so far, to the point that the kids are starting to ask, "Is it almost over?" The foundation for the future kitchen is completely laid, but drywall patching and repair is just starting now, so I'm guessing we're at the one-third done point. 

First floor transformation

Looking in from the great room to the main house

   Because the kitchen is now at ground zero level, my refrigerator and oven are sitting in the dining room, just waiting. We're utilizing the "bonus fridge" in the garage, and a combination of hot plate, toaster oven, Instant Pot, griddle and grill for cooking. Cooking (and choosing WHAT to cook) has been a little challenging but not bad. In the beginning I was doing grilled foil packets, like sausage and peppers, chicken caprese, even a gnocchi and corn packet with a white wine sauce that would have probably have been really good if I hadn't run out of propane in the middle of cooking it. We've had a lot of burgers. We've had some quesadillas using the indoor griddle. We tend to order pizza once a week. We're eating more salad than usual as our side though, so that's a good thing! I've learned that I can't run another appliance with the microwave or hot plate at the same time in our basement. I've learned that our new microwave is super powerful and not to use the automatic reheat button because the kids will have to wait 10 minutes for their food to cool down. I've learned to shop light at the grocery store and plan just three days out at a time because we don't have that much fridge space, and then the kids are forced to eat leftovers because it's all we have (win/win!). There are extra steps to food prep (figuratively and literally, as I have to go upstairs to the garage fridge at least dozen times a day), but it hasn't been bad. 

   Our basement also has a utility sink, which has made doing dishes a breeze (not a cool, refreshing breeze, more like a hot and humid breeze that is still better than no movement at all). The kids do their own dishes half the time (depending on whether we're there and catch them before they slip away). Knox told a friend's mom that he's getting over his "spongeaphobia." We have only used paper plates once so far, when we had family over for an impromptu dinner and got takeout pizza and the restaurant threw the plates in as a courtesy! 

   Living in the basement with all that extra furniture hasn't been that weird either. We have a large TV area with two full-size couches and a love seat and the great room's entertainment center; the kids' cubbies toy storage got moved around and greatly reduced to what they actually still play with (sort of); and the dining room table became the temporary countertop holding our daily-used appliances. The breakfast table, which was Josh's grandmother's kitchen table, sits against a wall and seats three, and we pull it away from the wall when all four of us are home want to sit together for a meal or a board game. We also have full walkout French doors with a picnic table on the patio and our glass table and chair set on the deck above. The kids usually fight us on eating outside because of the occasional (but non-confrontational) wasp that comes by, but Josh and I use these outdoor areas as much as we can.

Temporary kitchen in basement

   I would say the hardest part is getting used to all the noise. The cats are similarly pretty terrified of construction sounds (I hate the Sawzall, too, Sweetie Pie!) so we take them upstairs to the master bedroom before work begins each day. Most of their days are spent sleeping under my bed, unless the windows are open, in which case they sleep on the coffee table by the front window. The bonus for the cats though is that we are in the basement with them in the afternoons and evenings when work is done, and they love it. You know, in their cat way, where they don't really interact more with us but they look 20 percent happier even though they are just sleeping. 

   A cousin who went through a kitchen remodel a few years ago asked if I was getting decision fatigue, but since I took my time with the kitchen and dining room decisions over a period of about six months, there haven't been too many decisions to be made. And when there is something I don't care about, like where to reposition a floor vent for the HVAC, I let them know I don't care and to do what they think is best. Now that we've designated the area that is going to be the office, we've started making decisions about what the desk and cabinet space will be like, and we are making these decisions faster and perhaps with less hand-wringing, but that's kind of refreshing. 

Future office being carved out of the breakfast nook!

   The timing has felt so easy and right, that I don't feel like the project is moving too fast or too slow. God's timing has been such a gift: the out-of-stock floor we had our hearts set on came back in stock on a night I happened to be looking at Home Depot's website for something else; the floors were delivered on a day I was home and had cleaned the garage out early even though we had put the delivery date on hold; the day we wanted to put in the sliding door was sunny and breezy and the perfect day to have windows open and a gaping hole in our wall. There have been little hold-ups here and there, but I am full of praises and not complaints! Living in our temporary all-in-one basement has been easier than the packing up and moving stage, so let that be an encouragement to you if you have a renovation project you have wanted to do but were too worried about the mess and complications of living through a renovation!